Reduce Spacing In $<a>$

Question

In math, one often needs to put a letter inside the symbols <>, e.g. to denote a cyclic group <x> generated by some element x. However, plain text displays the symbols < and > as an upside down exclamation point and an upside down question mark, respectively, while math type displays a large space like so:

< x > 

Is there some way to reduce this spacing?

Answer 1

If it's important to keep the same shape of > then make sure you're using the amsmath package because it gives you three types of negative space: thin, medium and thick. Per your question, negative spacing is the method to reduce spacing. This code shows your options:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}
$<x>$\\
$\langle x \rangle$   \\
$< \, x \,>$\\
$< \negmedspace x \negmedspace >$\\
$< \negthickspace x \negthickspace >$\\
\end{document} 

Personally, I like Jeff's solution or the solution with negmedspace.

Answer 2

I swear I searched for a long time before posting my question....but right after asking, I found the solution.

For anyone else who might want to know, the solution is to use \langle in place of < and \rangle in place of >.